This invention relates to apparatus for automatically stuffing tubular food casing with food product, especially meat type products such as sausage meat.
There have been a number of problems associated with known food casing stuffing machines. In particular, there has been no reliable way to automatically attach hanging loops, especially string loops, to the end of a stuffed food casing product. It has been difficult to control the flow of meat through the stuffing horn so that flow reliably starts and stops so that the flow properly fills the casing and so that food product does not continue to leave the stuffing horn after the desired section of food casing is filled. Further, it has been difficult to clean devices that control the flow of food product. There has further been a problem with existing apparatus for stuffing tubular food casings with respect to speed of processing. Cycle times for automatically stuffing food casing have not been as fast as desired. Another problem associated with existing apparatus for stuffing and closing tubular food casings has been a tendency for some clips to improperly bend around an end of a stuffed food casing link, e.g. a sausage link, to properly close the casing without leakage, injury to the casing, process interruption or sharp points extending from the closure. A further problem has been that conveyors for moving stuffed food casing product from a closure area have not been sufficiently adaptable to handle various lengths of food casing links, including slack filled links and that to the extent that such conveyors were adaptable, they sometimes extended and retracted relative to the frame of the apparatus thus creating a striking hazard to personnel in the area of the conveyor when it extended.
It is therefore an object of the invention to eliminate or ameliorate the problems as above described in addition to other problems subsequently described.